 | This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
 | This page in a nutshell: Editors in the midst of a dispute should not offer links to policy, guideline, or essay pages in place of reasoned rebuttals. Doing so may intimidate newcomers, may be perceived as insulting regular editors, and may confuse everyone. |
In the course of a disagreement on Wikipedia, participants may post links to policy and other pages in place of reasoned arguments. Even when done in good faith, such actions may sometimes be confusing to the readers, especially when linking to large and complex pages. It may be unclear which of the many points in that page one intends to refer to. Such behavior may also be interpreted as equivalent of saying "talk to the hand", i.e. uncivil.
This type of behavior is especially common in articles for deletion, where links to arguments to avoid in deletion discussions abound.